


Discovery on the Precipice: Part 4 of "The Sky's Altar Aflame"

by Cyra (lc_144725)



Series: The Sky's Altar Aflame [4]
Category: Being Human (US/Canada)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-03
Updated: 2019-03-03
Packaged: 2019-11-08 20:51:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17988317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lc_144725/pseuds/Cyra
Summary: Freshly unburied and ravenous, Aidan's only salvation comes in its usual form: Aracelis





	Discovery on the Precipice: Part 4 of "The Sky's Altar Aflame"

**Author's Note:**

> Reminder: I have made (and will make) no promises that this series will be linear, keep up with continuity, seem like they’re meant to be in the same storyline, or generally make sense (individually or together). I write these as they come to me regardless of any bits of the series contradicting or supporting them. I MIGHT go back in later, once the series is completed, and fix all of that. For now, however, it’s vital for anyone reading to understand that I’m writing this for me and no one else; I’m sharing it simply because I can. Anyway, I hope you enjoy reading!

     In my life, I’d felt what it was like to die or to be so close that, even after all was said and done, the rancid essence of death’s essence still stung my throat and prodded tears from my eyes. I was all too familiar with my own demise and the fall of those I cared for.

      So when I felt the mind-numbing, sand-grating-my-veins torment of an all-encompassing hunger outmatched only by a lassitude intense enough to blind, I foolishly hoped all my previous experience would finally lend me an upper hand. But that’s not how death works and it’s not at all how Aidan worked. No amount of knowledge or confrontations with it would prepare you for the next brush of its hand against the most intimate parts of your soul. It nearly overtook me. My only salvation was that the sensations were second-hand. It didn’t stop the granite beneath my fingers from shattering, though, or the wall from shattering as my fist slammed against it after I sank to the floor and waited for the bombardment to die down enough to allow function. My fangs, which had elongated during the onslaught, slowly receded back into my gums and the nauseating cramps of hunger abated slowly as I regained my composure.

     As soon as my coherency pierced the haze of fatigue and famine, my first thoughts were consumed by the one feeling this even more intensely than me: _Aidan_. With one branch of my focus, I managed to remember turning the stove off and another was devoted to getting to him as soon as possible.

     I felt my body dissipate as light until it coalesced on the side of a road in the middle of nowhere. A damaged automobile was hanging open before me, the back doors revealing a bloody mess dripping from the back of the van. On the ground, to the side of the van, lay Aidan starved and- _bitten_? Panic surged as I watched him choke before his eyes slipped closed. I fell to my knees at his side and opened a wound on my palm, placing it over his neck where puncture wounds didn’t even have enough blood to leak anymore. His life was ebbing away much too quickly. He was going to die again, with finality this time. _I’m going to lose him_.

     “Aidan? Aidan listen to me. If you can hear me please just listen. You have to hold on, okay? Just hold on. I can save you; I swear I can. You just have to hold on- _please_!” My voice shook and tears welled in my eyes. I knew exactly what had happened here. Aidan’s unkempt beard and drained, paler-than-usual complexion told me everything I needed to know even as I tethered my life force to the essence of the vampire splayed out in the dirt in front of me. I allowed my vitality to bleed into him and we shared in the energy I kept within myself.

     He’d been buried. I could sense the imprisonment in the smell of the earth all around him, the reflexive self-containment position remnant of having been left in a coffin, and honestly simply because it all explained his absence from my radar in the last year. I hadn’t even considered that something had happened to him. I was just so glad I never sensed he was in danger again. I fell into the illusion that he could live his afterlife without going and getting himself tied up in all the absolute _bullshit_ he always seemed to gravitate toward. I could live in peace while knowing he was safe. I was wrong, so horrifically wrong. Instead, he’d been suffering, tormented with bouts of insanity gnawing at his mind before it conquered him, all while helplessly imprisoned away from blood and forced to starve. It was arguably a fate worse than death. Improvement in his form yanked me from my guilt as I stiffened, waiting for results.

     His sallow cheeks filled a little more, definition seeming less like famine and more like strength. His wound sealed beneath my hand and I let mine do the same. Fangs gleamed in the evening light between opening lips, his body trying to satisfy his hunger through typical means. Hope began to overtake panic as his hand moved in a flash to seek out a warm vein, a source of blood. Even as his teeth sank into my arm and bone was crushed beneath his fingers I could only feel a euphoric sense of relief as onyx peered back to me when I met his eyes.

     Careful not to wake him past the post-fed haze when he released me, I coaxed him over to the back of the van and reached for the least damaged container of untainted blood. I left it out and open for him when he was ready for it and let him doze off as I left, immediately ending up in my living room. 

 _He won’t remember you,_ I told myself, which caused me contradictory feelings of reassurance and a twinge of suppressed disappointment. _Your blood’s too potent; the feed will strip his memory and he’ll reawaken next to the jars. You were never here. He can never know._ I collapsed onto the couch while heaving a sigh. Aidan Waite was going to be the death of me. And from the smell of the cake in the oven I forgot to turn off, he was going to be the end of my baking creations as well. _At least the fudge frosting’s okay…_

**Author's Note:**

> Anyway, I hope everyone enjoys their day. Have fun; don’t die; make new friends; don’t talk to strangers!


End file.
